Followers

Thursday, April 29, 2010

It emerged last night that a man from Scotland, who had been asked his opinion on every matter known within Oceania for the last 3 years, had been stripped of his right to voice an opinion in a private conversation because a journalist had recorded it.

“A 59 year old man from Scotland had expressed a private opinion about an oldspeak conversation with a 66 year old woman,” said Charrington Billingsworth Detective Inspector of the Ministry of Truth, speaking from his Fleet Street office. “Following the incident Mr Brown spent several hours of re-education in the studios of Radio 101.”

The ruling from the Ministry of Truth explained that the right to have a private opinion was automatically lost should a telescreen truth crew manage to record it.

The incident happened following a brief conversation between Mr Gordon Brown and Mrs Gillian Duffy, a life long Ingsoc supporting prole from Rochdale in the North West of Airstrip One. Mrs Duffy is an economic and geopolitical expert with an hours-long plusgood reputation within the Ministry of Truth. She commented to Mr Brown that she felt the stabilisation of the Oceania’s economy and the inward migration of workers from outside her road may both have been doubleplusungood and made her feel disappointed to be a supporter of Ingsoc. Afterwards Mr Brown commented that the Ministry of Love had not properly vetted her before his conversation and that the prole held un-revisioned views.

“Mr Brown’s description of her as being a dangerous radical set about bringing down the party and Big Brother and that in future contacts should be with outer party members only, who had been pre-vetted and thought’s policed, were picked up by a Sky Truth telescreen microphone,” explained Billingsworth. “As such unlike everyone else who has ever closed a door after an unappetising conversation, Mr Brown will now be repeatedly counselled across the front pages of all of the Ministry of Truth’s publications until May 7th, when he will become an unperson.”

Mr Brown’s duckspeak was brought to the attention of Mrs Duffy in a spirit of plusgood openness without any self promotion or bias by Ministry of Truth operatives.

“You’ve been into the Sky Truth van to hear what the Sky Truth microphone picked up after your conversation, ” asked a detective from an unnamed branch of the Ministry of Truth. “Can you tell the Sky Truth telescreen viewers how this makes you feel?”

Preparations for tonight’s telescreen debate between the Inner Party leaders have been complicated by Gordon Brown’s insistence that all participants must be naked so all microphones are clearly visible. In addition the taps must be left running in all toilets that he visits and the radios must be turned up as loud as possible in all meeting areas where Mr Brown is relaxing with his medication.

The loss of the right of Mr Brown to hold a private opinion is not expected to have any impact on the behaviour of the Scottish ruling elite that have been in control of Airstrip One since the last free election in 1984.

“Scottish opinion will be undimmed,” said Detective Billingsworth. “A Mr Alex Salmond has more than enough opinions for everyone.”

Saturday, April 24, 2010

Following over a week of flight chaos caused by a huge cloud of ash from the erupting Eyjafjallajokull volcano there has been outrage at the settlement agreed with the enraged Icelandic resident, who many believe has held the European travelling public and airline industries to ransom.

“Forcing airlines to stop flying until your demands are reached? It's been extortion, pure and simple,” said Duncan Billingsworth of the Unite union. “That's our trick. Although hats off to that cloud of ash, we only managed to ground British Airways, not all airlines.”

The Volcano is believed to have been bought off by airlines that realised that unlike a normal weather system, a Volcano may be able to keep its disruption up for decades, forcing many airlines out of business. Some carriers have had to run disrupted flight plans on increasingly convoluted routes through Spain in a desperate attempt to get passengers to their destinations, and avoid paying expensive hotel bills.

“We have been forced to land a lot of our flights to Germany at airports in Madrid,” said a spokesman for Ryanair. “This has of course caused some disruption for Ryanair passengers trying to get to Germany as Spain is closer than we normally fly them.”

Airline manufacturers and operators across the globe have gained more information and understanding of the impact of volcanic ash on aero-engines. This has led to the re-opening of European airspace and the gradual re-uniting of thousands of whining passengers stranded overseas with their moaning families back in the UK.

“Meteorologists and volcanologists are undecided as to exactly when the skies of Britain will finally be free from the gloom of this overbearing cloud damaging the economy,” said one satirist. “Gordon Brown will be leaving office on May 6th, but the ash may linger for longer.”

Iceland has declined to comment on suspicions that following a year of economic turmoil, during which the entire country was effectively bankrupt, owing billions to international creditors, it raised some suspicions when the north Atlantic island was set on fire. Insurance experts will be scrutinising any insurance claims carefully.

Max Clifford has said that his new client, the Eyjafjallajokull volcano, will reveal the full details of its explosive blow-up in a forthcoming exclusive interview with Heat magazine.

Sunday, April 04, 2010

Pablo Billingsworth, 38, a retired IT consultant from the Northwest of England said that his new High Definition television had enabled him to really explore deep into a TV presenter’s very essence revealing detail previously unavailable to light entertainment viewers.

“The picture clarity is just amazing, absolutely stunning,” said Mr Billingsworth. “You can see vivid colours, stunning movement and detail. And look, there you can actually see the waves of self loathing circling Paddy McGuinness’s soul when he presents ‘Take Me Out’.”

Mr Billingsworth said that the past few months he had spent with his new Samsung LED TV had revealed to him the breathtaking shallowness of Britain’s TV presenters.

“You just see such detail. The lack of depth and the coldness is all just brought into such an incredibly sharp focus,” he explained. “It is a humbling experience to peer into the depths of Vernon Kaye’s eyes during ‘Family Fortunes’. You can almost feel the vivid tones of cash that are shielding his fundamental being from the vacuum of being a sex-texting publicity funnel for his wife’s publishing career.”

Mr Billingsworth says that for him, High Definition is less about the presentation of a glorious image but more that the viewing experience is brought to life by opening up layers of hitherto invisible detail.

“We have always been able to look at the ‘Graham Norton Show’ and see the bright vividness of the sets and the majestic way each of his peals of hysterical laughter at his latest knob-gag is rendered into the sound of a hyena being flushed into a tunnel,” said Billingsworth. “Now we can peal away the orangeness of both the set and the man himself. We can see the deep underlying tones of the flaking paint of a seaside theatre dressing room, the broken bulbs of the make-up mirror and the echoing of sobs for a career with the breadth of a single line of HD pixels. It’s very satisfying.”

Mr Billingsworth said that he was looking forward to the full range of BBC channels going HD, which would enable him to take in the spectacular vista of Richard Hammond.

“I think it will be amazing to see his soul during ‘Total Wipeout’,” said Pablo. “I expect it will be like watching high quality images of the craters on the surface of the moon. I’ll be able to see the detailed printing on each fifty pound note that quickly fills each pock-mark created by taking cart-loads of cash for voicing puns over clips of prat-falling contestants that he will never meet.”

However even the latest technology is insufficient to reveal the hidden depths of some presenters.

“My TV will do over three million different shades of black,” said Billingsworth. “But even that isn’t enough to reveal anything interesting about Ant and Dec.”